Can't rank with certain keywords for the life of me
-
I have a website http://www.freescrabbledictionary.com in which functions as a scrabble dictionary lookup and word finder for scrabble. There are many keywords that rank well for this niche but the main ones I target are
Scrabble Dictionary
Scrabble Cheat
Scrabble Word Finder
Scrabble Help
I used to rank well for all these keywords, I am 4th with scrabble dictionary currently but with the other 3 am no where near the top. On March 24th I dropped off the map for scrabble cheat, scrabble word finder and scrabble help. I actually dropped to 9/10th for scrabble dictionary on that date as well but since then I have been able to hold on steady to 4th.
I can't figure out why I can't rank for those other keywords anymore. Its almost like Google has penalized me for those keywords. I have contacted Google a few times to ask if I have any penalties and they have told me that I don't.
Even though in my backlinking I have targeted these keywords I can't seem to rank for them no matter what I do. The only idea I have come up with is that Google has re-associated those other 3 keywords in a group and separated scrabble dictionary on its own.
I have other sites I have created in the same niche and I have noticed if the URL contains "word", "Finder" and/or "cheat" I can rank in the 3 keywords within about a week all the way up to the second page. My main site FSD has the highest DA and PA compared to my other sites. Any idea why I can't seem to rank for those other 3 keywords anymore?
-
Thanks for using my site also I have always had a hard time with "content" because no one uses my site for content, they use them for my forms (just like you :)) I consider myself a "tools" based website.
The way I figured was that people care more about my form than anything else, so putting that form on every page will make it easier for users to get what they need. That was my reason for adding the form to almost every page.
Fluff? Yeah totally fluff lol - Good ideas I will make some of those changes
Call to action - with trying to keep a form on every page could I make the call to action scroll down and place the form at the bottom of the page? or you think just have one main page with the form?
-
I agree with Mat that the more content the better. Also be sure to use common scrabble cheating words and cheating methods. Remember that Google is crawling all of your website and that the more keywords it picks up the better.
Also I notice that your website has a Google+ button on the bottom of your page, why not create a Facebook community around scrabble? Many people love this game and being able to share high scores and scrabble game stories might prove to be beneficial for many users? -
Hi Cesar - I've actually used your site in the past! That's cool.
That date sounds suspiciously like you were hit with by the Panda. Panda is a Google update that mostly targeted 'thin' content - it was updated on the 23rd. If you ever get a sudden drop in rankings like that it is always good to check http://www.seomoz.org/google-algorithm-change which lists when updates happen. That is fast becoming the page I link to most frequently in Q&A answers!
So - why might they think you have thin content? I'll look quickly at 2 pages: http://www.freescrabbledictionary.com/ - ranking for scrabble dictionary & http://www.freescrabbledictionary.com/scrabble-cheat/ - presumably the one that has dropped for scrabble cheat.
OK, the two pages have a few paragraphs of unique content, but it is really what I would call "fluff" - it doesn't really serve any purpose other than to tell the search engines that you wish to rank for that page. That is not an accusation - I've written plenty of fluff myself. Just telling it how it is. This text is also quite a way down the page which indicates that it isn't the most important.
The "meat" of the page is the form. This is identical on both pages. So really we really have 2 pages that are only really different in terms of the fluff. That is textbook for the sort of thing that Panda hit.
How to fix it then?
I'd consider actually providing information that is more relevant to the search "scrabble cheat". List common cheat methods (and how to spot them) plus a big call to action pointing back to the main search tool. At first glance I can't see any need to replicate that form on every page.
Your scrabble helper page is actually following roughly this process - although I would make the link back to the main tool much more obvious. However the on page optimisation isn't great on that one - tweak that up and get some people to link to it and I'd imagine that could help quite a bit.
Good luck with it.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
'spammy' domains redirecting to website
Hi Everyone, I hope that someone will be able to help us with this one as we have trawled the internet looking for a solution! We have multiple domains (.com/.co.uk/.net versions) which all point to the one website, however, some of these domains have a high spam score - 9-11. Our first initial reaction would be to remove the auto redirects, but, the other domains have been a source of conversion in previous months (or so analytics tells us). So what I'm wondering, is do we remove the 'spammy' links from redirecting to our site, or do we leave them there? We certainly don't want to risk a penalty. Thanks for reading!
Link Building | | hydra_creative0 -
Homepage outranking subpage for main keyword, but subpage is more optimized for the keyword.
Recently did a site redesign, 95% of the site and keywords are matching up in terms of keyword to what page is ranking for that keyword. All and all was expected and pleased with the redesign, except... A subpage ( PA 1 ) really is a landing page for the main keyword in question is only one jump from the hompage, is it's own category and has the exact match anchor text to its page from the homepage, has a total of 14 total keyword usages. The homepage has a PA of 28, mentioned the keyword once in the body text in form of anchor link, yet still steals the thunder from the main keyword. There aren't a ton of backlinks, but ones we do have 95% of them goto the homepage. Subpage in question has a on page grade of A for the keyword, while the homepage has an on page grade of C. No backlinks at all for this page yet. Subpage even uses the keyword as it's url name, so kinda at a loss to what else I can do, it's a new page, so alll I keep thinking is the issue is the page authority, it's linked to from other pages on the site. Any suggestions?
Link Building | | Deacyde1 -
Using Bing's linkfromdomain: operator I'm finding spam links
Hi I've recently discovered Bing's linkfromdomain: operator and have been testing it on a few of my wordpress sites which are running the DIVI theme from elegant themes These are new sites with little or no content yet I was a bit alarmed when the results showed site I definitely had not linked to eg slickdeals dot net
Link Building | | briandee
2521.gen778 dot com
9gag dot com
flowers.ftd dot com
www.jmldirect dot com
pubs.rsna dot org is this an error from the Bing linkfromdomain: operaror because when I run the domains through xenu these sites do not show Hope someone can help0 -
Easy JOB - Ranking a Website For Easy Keywords (Moz Keyword Difficulty below 25)
Hello Moz Members,
Link Building | | Sebastian21
Easy JOB - Ranking a Website For Easy Keywords (Moz Keyword Difficulty below 25)
Ok so idea is simple here but I need some help because lack of time. I have 4 pages that I want to rank for these keywords in the next 1-2 months. Please contact me if you Done SEO in the past 3-5 years successfully and use White Hat Tecniques ! For more details contact me directly via email at sebastyan62@gmail.com or Contact@smartwebsiteflipping.com Thanks in Advance ! Keywords:
Sophia Hills
Mount Sophia Condo
sophia hills mount sophia
www.thesophiahills.com.sg high rental yield
dhoby ghaut rental yield
http://thesophiahills.com.sg/sophiahills/ Sophia Hills location
location map
sophia hills site plan
sophia hills location map
http://thesophiahills.com.sg/location-map/ Sophia hills floorplans
floor plans
floorplans
http://thesophiahills.com.sg/floor-plans/ THANK YOU !0 -
Keyword variation.
Hello dear community, I'm just starting to really understand how seo and in-page optimization works that to SEOMoz. I have done alot of seo for my other pages in the bad way expecting great results which acually hurt me more than help 😞 So right now I'm working on application which takes screenshots of your desktop and upload small files on the portals you select. I have done the website (template and most of the content) but I would like to know when I'm going to start and build some links, what are some of the best keywords I should choose? I do understand already than this is not an exact math, but any kind of help would be awesome! I would like to focus more around "screenshot" keyword and not that much on file upload. I know I may ask kind of much, but anything is better. With great respect, Akhlis
Link Building | | akhlis0 -
Can No Follow Links Hurt Rankings?
Thanks to sites like SEOmoz and good folks like yourselves I was able to understand enough about SEO to know that the company we outsourced the SEO to were doing at best a sloppy job. I have seen that the link profile of site is totally unnatural in terms of factors such as relevancy and anchor text but also that around 95% of the 800 links are no follow. My question is whether these low quality no follow links causing unnatural anchor text ratios and poor link relevancy would hurt our rankings? I am basically wondering if I have to now go and try to have all those links removed somehow to avoid any problems going forward?
Link Building | | Luia0 -
Can bad backlinks harm your website?
Hi, This has been discussed to death over the web on many forums, some discussions are even very heated arguing both sides. So... from what I have read on seomoz the answer to this question is... YES. And if one was so inclined to build bad backlinks to a competitor it would have a negative effect. Agree?
Link Building | | activitysuper0 -
Natural Link Profile - Ranking Signal?
Hi, Is a natural link profile a ranking signal? What is the value in a natural link profile? What is a (natural?) link graph? Is Majestic SEO the only company capable of visualizing a link graph? (I know the answers to these questions but I want to hear what SEOMoz has to say in the quasi-official standards of SEOMoz Q/A) Regards,
Link Building | | qlkasdjfw0